But one conversation that seems to have been remarkable absent from this revolution is any popular discussion around how, why and what we name these tools. Especially as the semantics around such technology is upending the very foundation of language: who knew you could order a pizza without words?

Michael Mauldin coined the term “chatterbot” to describe these conversational programs in 1994. He also named the first verbot (or verbal robot), Julia, while a graduate student at Carnegie Mellon University. HAL, Siri, Alexa, Cortana: We’ve been creating avatars in our likeness ever since.

Today, more than 34,000 chatbots exist on Facebook Messenger since the company opened the platform to outside developers in April, including one from the Guardian. Now a few of those language designers have begun breaking down this odd human-computer relationship – and yes, it’s still a little wonky.

From weapons to healthcare, we shape technology in our image – even though, as many point out, these bots don’t care what we call them. “Giving something a human name is a way of exerting control over it,” writes Adrienne LaFrance in The Atlantic, “a reminder that it works for you, that it exists within a human construct, even when the machine itself is wholly indifferent.” Expressing our trust through a wholesome moniker says nothing about AI’s effectiveness and everything about our comfort with the software, she says.

So the robots are coming, and how we embrace that future will depend on how much we see ourselves in the technology. In fact, naming your bot is the first big question for any technologist, according to Dennis Mortenson, the founder of x.ai, whose popular assistant programs are called Amy and Andrew Ingram (initials AI, of course).

Designers like Jacqueline Feldman at Kasisto (responsible for the bot Kai) have written about the more problematic aspects of personifying these tools, while giants like Google still decline to discuss the process publicly. LaFrance says the origin stories of popular bots like Siri usually say more about the engineer (or Silicon Valley culture) and basic market research – a female voice is less offensive; removing the name and first person pronoun improves user feedback, apparently – than any evil conditioning agenda. Only now our tools are talking back.

It’s also worth noting that Google’s new AI assistant is simply called, well, Google. Does that make you feel any better? Or how about Facebook’s recently leaked messaging assistant, M? Even as companies de-gender and refine their products, the future looks the same: these are tools to entice and comfort with an “identity” we all recognize. We are increasingly anthropomorphizing our technology, but how are we defining ourselves in this new era?

As a journalist, I hear enough jargon and wordplay to keep a running log. One phrase in particular gets me every time: “I’m sorry, I don’t have the bandwidth.” In other words: I’m too busy, distracted, overwhelmed to sufficiently address your question. More recently, it’s the variant: “I’m sorry, I’m at capacity.” My reaction is always the same: please, you’re not a router.

And that seems to me the real frontier with AI semantics: if chatbots don’t care what we call them, what does it say when technology starts naming us? Or more accurately, we start assuming the names and attributes of our brave new world?

It seems benign, but not having the bandwidth says I’m too busy to engage like a human. “Hey, it’s not personal,” the logic goes, but that’s exactly where we’re headed. Google’s one-word solution squares its ambition with a growing sophistication; it wants to build an individual Google for each of us. Is it so crazy then to think that we’re giving our machines human names and “personalities” to appear more relatable, to make us more comfortable, only to simultaneously use the language of technology to replace actual human emotions?

Just say you’re busy next time. Sure, you might be swamped this week, but you’re not a piece of hardware. I’d argue it’s not cute nor particularly healthy to align our emotional states with this stuff – unless we’re ready for what that means. As one designer notes, her success is making technology disappear, to make these AI tools “quieter” so we humans can use them more intuitively. But if intuition is the opposite of conscious reasoning that doesn’t sound very helpful to me.

We have a choice to engage in the world we create despite the ubiquity of the tools we share. It’s why that robot didn’t just buy the shirt for you. It’s a subtle but profound reality that still exists, from the margins of my notebook to the Internet of Things all around us. Language is a tool, after all. Let’s use it.